Dear John/Jane Q. Public:

Dear John/Jane Q. Public:

You have the flu.  That sucks and is a shame, etc. Its a bad year and right now ERs are filled with people with the flu.  Which is stupid. 

ATTENTION ALL FLU VICTIMS:

Follow this closely:
DO NOT, REPEAT, DO NOT,  COME TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM FOR YOUR FLU SYMPTOMS UNLESS YOU ARE:

1) >98 or < 1  years old
2) are dying

There is nothing we can do for you people. You are just going to have to ride it out.  You are going to have to do what people used to do in the old days: rest, fluids, perhaps chicken soup.

You are clogging up ERs right now, leaving less beds for the truly sick.  Your mother could be having a heart attack and we don't have a room for her because you and your flu are taking that bed.

If you do come, you will wait for hours in the waiting room with a mask on your face.  That doesn't sound very fun does it?

One last thing, DO NOT call an ambulance for flu symptoms.  It will not get you a bed in the ER any faster.  You will go out to the waiting room with everybody else.

That is all. Go about your business.

you getting older means I'm getting older

My son is 20 today, no longer a teenager.  Yikes. 

Perhaps this is inappropriate, but he knows how inappropriate I am anyway...

saturday night fever

I have already told you about the sophisticated, two hour long post bed bug patient visit shenanigans that is now policy at my hospital.  Well, now I have a new thing to add to the fight against vermin.

This has been around for about a year. It is a robot vermin destroyer. It looks like R2D2. It uses ultraviolet light to destroy bacteria.

Picture this: Its 1979. You are in your spiffy dress, you boyfriend in his 3 piece suit. You are on the dance floor at the local disco doing a bad imitation of John Travolta and that girl in Saturday Night Fever.
Strobes of light hit you and your partner as you get funky, get loose in the middle of the dance floor.

Thats what the robot looks like when it is doing its thing. A disco.  I am tempted to go in there and let my inner Donna Summer (RIP) out.  Anyway, at this point it is being using for post c diff visits.  BTW,  each robot costs $80,000.    Worth it?

we interupt this blog...

***PUBIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT***

Attention all citizens:

The following are not emergencies:

1) bug bites - unless it have swollen to the size of a baseball

2) the fact that you cannot control your teenage daughter or son

3) you are fatigued or can't sleep

4) you want your son, daughter, brother, sister, etc. to get chemical dependency treatment

5) the condom broke

6) you are hungover

7) G tube not working

8) the cut is less than 1"

9) any kind of medication refill

10) menstrual cramps

That is all...go about your business.

post christmas santa follies

I know Christmas is over...but this is too funny to pass up.
From one of my favorite docs: ZDoggMD